


Corporate Misstep

by Katrina, Skeren



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-21
Updated: 2015-01-21
Packaged: 2018-03-08 11:57:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3208322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katrina/pseuds/Katrina, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skeren/pseuds/Skeren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Paperwork is evil, but it does have unusual side effects.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Corporate Misstep

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on February 22nd of the year 2007 for the writingtogether community.

Somewhere along the line, hidden deep in the mountains of paperwork that Shinra Electrical Company produced, there had been a snag.

A large snag.

One that had affected every aspect of the company, but which only so many people could work on given the security level the snag had occurred at.

Sephiroth sighed to himself as he collected the next piece of paper. He focused intently on it, forcing the words on the page to stop wavering and blurring at him even as he brought it closer to his nose. Head propped up by his hand, he wondered absently if Zack was dead, given the lack of tired complaining coming from the man’s direction.

They had both been working on this mess for the last three or four days. Sephiroth had actually lost count, though given the way his eyes felt, he was betting on four. Zack had helped as long as he could, of course, but the man had staggered off a few times to get an hour or two of sleep before staggering back. He most likely assumed that Sephiroth was doing the same, but the general had been informed that this was top priority, given the company wide effect the paperwork issue had been having, so he hadn't taken the time to do so.

Right now, caught up in his musings as to if his second had finally just decided to die in order to avoid more paperwork, Sephiroth leaned closer still to the paper, trying to force it to make sense. Eyes drifting closed for perhaps the fourth or fifth time in the last hour, he finally stopped trying to keep them open, and thus slid from his barely propped up position to a more downwardly oriented one. He pillowed his head on the desk as the need for sleep finally overcame training and force of will.

In the other room, wondering if it would be worth it to just start signing the damn papers in blood, Zack sighed. He _hated_ paperwork. It was part of why he had gone into SOLDIER, even with his entry level scores. Those could have gotten him a nice bit of officer training and very likely a desk job, but he had wanted to go to Wutai. Granted, paperwork was only a tiny, tiny bit of it, but who wanted to sign off on papers all day?

Stupid SiC position and its paperwork. Evil. Totally and completely evil.

Rubbing his eyes, Zack glared tiredly at the piles still left. He was pretty sure that he and Seph were on the last loads of this stuff, but he was so sick of seeing it. There would have been an ‘accident’ with some fire materia if he didn’t know that it would just add to the paperwork avalanche.

Stupid paperwork.

If he ever found out where the tangle had happened that had ended up with this dumped on him, he was going to go find them and hurt them. Badly. Maybe he could strangle them with all the damnable red-tape that had this all knotted up even worse?

As he pondered what horrible, horrible things he would do to said imaginary person with the red tape, he heard a thump. That wasn’t expected. Wondering if he had imagined it, he sat at his desk quietly for a minute then looked in the direction of Seph’s office, listening hard. Not hearing anything at all, not even the scratching of the pen or Seph’s mumbling, he stood.

That had been his first big clue on how tired his friend was. The man had started mumbling threats under his breath now and then, and they had been the balm on Zack’s soul that kept him from just burning the building down. He’d never deprive Seph of that joy.

Standing, yawning large enough to pop his jaw, he staggered a bit towards Seph’s office. “Seph?”

There was no answer, which was understandable as Sephiroth was out cold at the moment, sleeping hard. At this point in time, he was really leaning more heavily in the direction of unconsciousness rather than simple sleep as his body had simply decided to get as much rest as it possibly could. It hadn't been overly concerned with if the man running it had agreed or not.

Eyes burning, Zack went over and poked the other man in the shoulder, watching him closely. Then he did it again, trying to see if Seph really was as out of it as he appeared to be.

Sensing no threat, as it was just Zack, Sephiroth stayed asleep, far too comfortable to move, not to mention the fact that _because_ it was _Zack_ , so no possible threat would even register. If anything, he simply slipped into a deeper sleep, relaxing on his paperwork under the poking.

Well, that answered that. Rubbing his eyes again, trying to ignore the burn, Zack braced himself and set about getting Seph up and over his shoulder. Not the most comfortable position for either of them, but at least he wasn’t wearing his armor, having shed that hours ago, because that would have made it a tad more problematic.

Once the other was settled against him, he staggered for the couch and nested the older man there instead. It took only a few minutes of work to get the taller man's boots and coat off. Stupid coat, being all tricky and stuff. After a moment of internal debate, Zack left the jacket under Seph and moved to the small storage closet in the room. Snagging one of the blankets he stored there, just in case of things like this, he draped it over the man, then grabbed another and used it as a makeshift pillow. After that, he studied him to make sure he wasn’t uncomfortable.

There was only a moment of small movements before Sephiroth settled quietly onto the couch, apparently fine and ready to just sleep more. His breathing was steady and there were no signs of him waking up anytime soon.

All right. With a nod, Zack looked at his desk, and then he looked at Seph’s. He had a decent sized pile of paperwork on his, and he knew Seph had been sparing him as much as he could, taking on most of their department’s paperwork himself.

Coffee. He needed more coffee.

Setting up a new pot, making it as strong as he could, he collected the paperwork he had left on his desk and moved it to sit on the stuff with Seph’s. Luckily, he was high enough in rank to be able to fill out just as many things as Seph could. Hells, it was part of his duties to take up what Seph couldn’t do. If they didn’t like it, they could bite him.

Settling in for the long haul, he drained his first cup of coffee.

This was going to be a long night.

///

He had no idea how long he had been asleep even though his internal clock said a large amount of time had passed. Though still feeling tired, thankfully the bone-weary exhaustion was gone, he felt a great deal better. However, he was confused on why he was where he was.

It had taken a long moment to realize that, while he was still in the office, he was here and not where he had been. The couch was comfortable, but he distinctly remembered being at his desk. As he pondered over that that, he sat up, looking around.

After a minute or two of focus while trying to puzzle it out, he realized that, yes, that was Zack at his desk. The top of said desk was a mess. Sugar and cream containers were scattered over one section of it, a coffee cup near them. In one corner, in his outgoing box, was a stack of manila envelopes.

Taking up most of the area was Zack, head pillowed on his arm, pen still gripped tightly in one hand, and his hair messily covering everything it could.

Sephiroth blinked a few times, then stared, one hand coming up to scrub at his eyes before looking again. The paperwork was gone.

If Sephiroth ever admitted to ever feeling giddy, this would be the moment.

But why was Zack at his desk? And was he really asleep? Why was he sleeping on Sephiroth’s desk? And most likely drooling on it, knowing Zack. Standing, he padded over quietly, noting the fact that his feet were just in socks, and lightly moved some of the mess of hair. He _was_ asleep. Rather soundly, too, given the lack of reaction to Sephiroth’s movements.

Looking in the trash and seeing the mass of even more sugar and creamer packets, not to mention the collection of coffee filters, he decided the man must have been running on pure caffeine since Sephiroth had fallen asleep. He wondered how much more sleep Zack had gotten after that.

Highly confused as to why the man would do this, given his well known hatred of all things paperwork related, Sephiroth shook his head. After a moment of no reaction from his second, he nudged the man, seeing if that woke him up. If not, he would simply move him, as it appeared Zack had done for him.

All the nudge got was a limp rock as Zack didn’t even attempt to fight it. His body had reached the point of “fuck you, I’m sleepin” after having gone too long on caffeine and a sleep deprivation hyper.

Well, that was that. Pulling on his boots and collecting his armor, Sephiroth simply gathered Zack up in his arms and then started back towards his rooms. They were closer than Zack’s, and there was no reason to leave the man on the office couch when he had been so self-sacrificing, though Sephiroth didn’t understand why he had done it.

A bit of mumbling was Zack’s only reaction to the movement, as he was apparently far too out of it to care much.

Barely getting the door secured behind him, Sephiroth turned and headed down the hall, checking for awareness, but once it was apparent that the man simply wasn’t going to wake up, Sephiroth used that attention to just make sure that they got to where they were going. The halls were quiet, and he had the feeling it was a great deal later than he had initially thought, but he ignored that. Instead, he focused on figuring out how to get his door open.

For a moment, Zack roused a bit. Wasn’t at the desk, still had the pen. Oh, good, had the pen. That was his level of coherency for the moment, given he could almost put thoughts together. A familiar scent was in his nose, and he easily recognized Seph. Mumbling his name, the dark haired man relaxed again, dropping back fully into sleep.

Sephiroth eyed him, but he focused quickly enough on getting into his rooms. Once that was done, he somehow managed the process of getting the door closed and locked behind him. There. Secure. After that, it was just a matter of putting things down. Zack on the couch, the rest of his items where they normally went.

As Zack mumbled and curled into a ball, still clutching the pen, Sephiroth went and found an extra blanket to drop over the man. He stood there a moment, studying him, then went to his room and sprawled out on his covers. Once he was settled, he more or less passed back out, body still hungry for sleep.

///

He ached. And felt a bit sick. Should have eaten something before collapsing, but, well, collapsed.

Opening tired eyes, he sat up slowly, and then stared blankly at the wall. He knew that wall. How did he know that wall? Oh, yeah, familiar wall. After a bit of continuing to stare blankly at the familiar wall, he looked around a bit and spotted the time.

“Shit.”

Shoving himself to his feet and stumbling around a bit, he found the phone to make a quick call, making sure that they had picked up the paperwork. He had not done all that work for nothing. After making sure they had, and feeling a great deal more relieved, he had called for food. Was pretty sure that was Seph’s wall, so ordered for him as well.

In the other room, Sephiroth could hear movement. On some level, he knew that it was Zack, so instead of doing anything like getting up and possibly killing the intruder for interrupting his sleep, he simply tried to hide in the covers he was stretched out on top of.

Moving as quietly as he could at the moment, Zack staggered over and leaned against the door, waiting for food. That way he’d be able to answer it right away and hopefully not disturb Seph too much. He had heard him moving some in the other room, so knew he was in there. He answered the door when it was knocked on, and ignored the blinking of the delivery person, who had apparently not expected someone who wasn’t Seph. That was okay, he gave Zack the food, so nobody had to get hurt.

Slowly waking up, Sephiroth decided he really didn’t want to, but he had heard the sound of the door opening and closing. The smell of food finished the job of rousing him, and he crawled off the bed, clad in just his pants, to find Zack in his kitchen. “You’re awake.”

Tired eyes looked at him before Zack grinned weakly. “I cling to my theory that this is all a dream and Inky agrees with me. We’re actually both still blissfully asleep and will never have to deal with paperwork again.” Fingers brushing the pen tucked behind his ear, he grinned. “Surprised I didn’t wake up in the office.”

“I carried you.” Plain, obvious fact. “You did my papers.”

Zack nodded and yawned, hungry but feeling a bit sick due to the fact he hadn’t eaten any real food for several days now and the thought of it nauseated him slightly. “We’d been working on them for way too long. I wanted them done.”

“You could have woken me.” That was the confusing part. Zack hated paperwork, why would he do his and Sephiroth’s when he could have just woken Sephiroth to finish his job?

Zack yawned, sinking into a chair. “First sleep you had gotten. Wasn’t going to wake you up for something that stupid.”

“I could have waited,” Sephiroth pointed out softly, collecting some food and just…staring at it for a long moment before moving to sit down next to Zack. This was a very odd morning so far.

“You needed it,” Zack helpfully pointed out, head propped on his hand as he looked at Seph sleepily. “You hadn’t slept since we started to go down under the flood. How you feeling now?”

“Tired.” Easy enough answer, though he forced himself to start eating the food even though it didn’t appeal to him either.

“You need more sleep.”

There was a pause, then he nodded slightly. “You did my papers.” He eyed him again, still trying to figure out why the man would do something he hated that much.

Zack nodded. “Mmhmm.” He was amused some by Seph’s fixation, but didn’t say anything about it yet.

Studying him, puzzled, Sephiroth sipped at the glass of juice that had come with the meal. “You wanted it finished that badly?”

A shrug. “You were tired of it, and I was more than tired of it….”

“It was,” he paused, watching him a moment as he drank more juice, trying to come up with the appropriate word, “extensive.”

“It,” Zack corrected, “was insane.”

He could concede that. “Perhaps slightly.”

“Perhaps a lot. Seph, if I _ever_ find out who caused that, you’ll have to bail me out of jail. You’d do that for me, wouldn’t you?”

Setting down his cup, he looked back at Zack with a soft exhale, not sure if he should be amused or not. “Going out murdering the cause, hmm?”

“Something like that. Maybe I’ll just damage them horrible. Inky will help.” He grinned. “I’d probably get a company award, really. I’ll share it with Inky as well.”

A few blinks. “Excuse me?”

“I’m gonna hurt them.” He eyed Seph, wondering just how much more sleep the man needed.

“…Inky?”

That got a sheepish cough. Scratching the back of his head, Zack's grinned. “Yeah, that's the pen. I was starting to get really tired at the end, and possibly poisoned myself with coffee, so I was talking to it to keep myself awake and focused. Decided if I was going to do that level of crazy, I might as well go the whole way and give it a name as well.”

He eyed the man a moment, blinking, and then made a soft sound of comprehension. Ah, Zack was just insane.

Seeing the look on Seph’s face, he laughed softly. “I was tired, what can I say?”

“I very rarely see you that tired.” It was a soft comment as he focused a bit more on food.

“You’ll see it again someday, I’m sure. Didn’t expect to see you fall over like that, though. Last time you did that was in Wutai after that month of heavy combat.” He yawned again. “Sure I will again, though. Hopefully it’ll take a few decades.” Head propped on his hand again, his eyes shut.

There was a long, long moment of quiet as Sephiroth slowly absorbed that. He couldn’t mean it like that, could he?

“You plan so far ahead?”

“Mmhmm.” It was a soft sound, Zack starting to snooze off again at the table.

Sephiroth couldn’t help but stare. “Honestly so?”

Another sound of agreement from Zack. Then he added, in a soft mumble, “Course, we’re friends, right?”

There was a moment of completely stunned shock for Sephiroth. He honestly had no idea on how to answer that, at all. After a few more seconds of hesitation, he leaned over to examine him, as if Zack had suddenly turned to a new and odd color.

That registered just a bit with Zack, and he mumbled something incomprehensible before his breathing smoothed out again as he dozed back off.

Finishing the food, and still studying Zack, he collected the man, pausing at the mumble of his name before Zack shifted to relax more against him. That was so odd, and, shaking his head, Sephiroth moved back to his room to dump the man on his bed. Watching him curl up with small nod, he slipped out of the room to go and lock the front door again, just in case Zack had not, before he padded back.

In the few seconds he had been gone, Zack had managed to curl himself up into the sheets, covering his head and still sound asleep. He hummed a moment, aware that he was still tired himself, then decided there was enough room and shoved Zack over. After a second shove, the first having gotten a near silent grump, there was enough room for him to get into his own bed and he did so, slipping under the covers this time instead of just falling on top of them.

Settling on his stomach, he studied Zack. Had he meant what he said? He couldn’t honestly mean to plan so far ahead. It was foolish to make plans like that. They could be disrupted so easily by life. Especially their lives. People died so easily….

Zack continued to sleep, breathing slow and easy, apparently far more tired than he should be. He looked peaceful there. Slowly, Sephiroth petted his hair, cautiously and just once, then brought his hand back and settled down properly, drifting into sleep.

He wondered what other plans Zack had made for the future.  



End file.
